


The Year After the Year of Living Dangerously

by notunbroken



Category: Battlestar Galactica (2003)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-09-10
Updated: 2012-09-10
Packaged: 2017-11-13 22:36:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/508468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notunbroken/pseuds/notunbroken
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>10 McSweeney's lists titles, 10 stories about the missing year on New Caprica.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Year After the Year of Living Dangerously

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by ["Reasons Not to Fear the Reaper"](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/11336) by agonistes. 



> Inspired by the lovely (and, at this point, throwback!) “Reasons Not to Fear the Reaper” by agonistes, which used titles of McSweeney’s Lists as titles/headers. I’ve used different titles here to inspire a New Caprica (cue the eye-rolls; yes, I know) fic.

[ _Vacation Slogans for Lower-Tier Towns_ ](http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/vacation-slogans-for-lower-tier-towns)

"I suppose it's fortunate that most people are actually excited to settle down here. Lords know that I wouldn't want to be responsible for selling the benefits of this place." Laura paused, then shook her head slightly. She couldn't lose the sense of responsibility she still felt for the government and its citizens. "Not that that's my problem now, anyway."

She stood in the middle of a spartan gray tent, on the cloudy, barren world that was New Caprica. Of all of the indecencies she'd faced since sacrificing the dream of Earth on the altar of public shortsightedness, this was among the worst. Losing the presidency overnight, facing hatred in the eyes of half the Fleet, weeks of idle boredom on _Galactica_ ; these all paled in comparison to the moment when she stepped off a raptor and accepted her new life on the sad little planet. 

In the entrance behind her, Bill cleared his throat. She turned to find him watching her with a half-grin and an almost mischievous glint in his eyes. It was an expression she'd become familiar with over the previous weeks, one that he wore frequently while off-duty.

"What?"

He slightly lifted the box he held. "Where do you want me to put this?"

She shrugged. "Someplace dry. If you can find it."

There was a tarp on the floor, but the canvas roof was not quite sealed against the persistent drizzle outside. Drops formed along the support poles, eventually sliding to the floor where they accumulated on the plastic sheet in miniature puddles. Her plot seemed to be on low ground, and she cringed to think what an actual storm would do to her new home.

She approached a roughly-made cot in the far corner, consisting of a thin, lumpy mattress laid atop two wood pallets. It was the only thing resembling furniture inside the tent. Laura sighed heavily. This was not going to be easy living.

Just as she was going to tell Bill to set the box on the bed, she noticed that the roof was leaking in a steady drip, right into the middle of the mattress. She gritted her teeth. "Frakking tent."

"What's that?"

"I said that this tent is a piece of shit."

Having already found a dry spot for the box, he moved to stand next to her. Following her glare, he noticed the issue almost immediately. "That's not good."

"No. It isn't."

"Let me..." He glanced around the small space, as if he might find a solution, but there was nothing inside the tent except the cot and the few things she'd brought from _Galactica_. "I'm gonna go find something to patch that with."

"Don't worry about it." She didn't want him to think that he needed to solve her problems, now that she was a powerless civilian.

"Laura. You have to get it taken care of before it really starts raining. From what the meteorologists can tell, there's a good chance of a monsoon in the coming weeks."

"Great." She wrapped her arms around herself, trying to will away the wave of helplessness she felt upon being trapped on this planet. As if a leaky tent in the mist wasn't bad enough. Bring on the monsoons.

Bill left, and came back several minutes later carrying a metal crate. Inside was a pouch and a smaller plastic box. He emptied the contents onto the mattress and handed the crate to Laura. "Here. To get your suitcase up off the floor, for the time being."

"Where'd you get this stuff?"

"From the raptor." He stared up toward the leak and unzipped the pouch he'd brought. "Raptors are meant for long-term missions, so they all have certain supplies stocked."

She feigned shock, "Oh, my. You're misusing government-issued supplies?"

He pulled a flat, metallic piece of material from the pouch and held it up to the faint light. "It's not misuse if I'm using them."

She smirked. "If you say so."

"Do you mind if I..." he gestured toward the cot.

"Be my guest." He climbed up to examine the leak, and Laura busied herself with balancing her suitcase on the crate. She'd need to find some kind of real furniture sooner or later, if this was going to work at all.

She frowned, thinking about where she would even be able to find such things. Her life before had been consumed with duties of running the government. She never had to worry about necessities like furniture or food or a dry place to sleep.

A screeching sound made her turn back to the cot. Bill was ripping a thick adhesive backing from the metallic square. He pressed it to the canvas, then methodically smoothed it flat.

"Emergency airtight patch. It should take care of your leak." His attention remained on the task a little too resolutely when he said, "You know, it's not too late for you to come back to _Galactica_."

Laura grinned and ducked her head. She had to admit that the offer was tempting, having seen her new “home”. The problem was that she didn't have a role on _Galactica_. The first few days, spent recovering from the election aftermath, were nice. But she had found the subsequent weeks stretching out into oblivion without a worthwhile use of her time. 

It didn't matter anyway. Three weeks into the settlement, Baltar had more or less ordered her to the surface, along with Tory and any other civilian who had supposedly "in-demand" skills. Laura followed the settlement directive (albeit grudgingly), and opted to try to make the best of it. With that in mind, she forced some brightness into her voice when she said, "What, and leave this _charming_ locale? I might as well give up a beach resort vacation."

He shot her an incredulous look. "If you say so."

"I heard the bar to bathhouse ratio is roughly five-to-one. What's not to like?"

"I can tell you that plan is gonna backfire." He chuckled, "Who's in charge of laying out the settlement, a college student?"

She recalled glimpsing Baltar earlier that morning, walking from his shuttle with a young woman on each arm. She scowled, feeling her facade slipping. "More or less."

"Well at least you'll be dry. Indoors, anyway." Bill inspected the patch, then stepped down from the cot. "And the settlement isn't that bad, all things considered."

"What a ringing endorsement," Laura said, "Maybe they should print that on a pamphlet: 'New Caprica City, not that bad, considering the entire planet is awful.'"

"What happened to making the best of the situation?"

"It might be worse than I expected." She took a deep breath and rolled her shoulders a few times, loosening the tension there. "But I will say that even though I disagree with the settlement, I'm actually looking forward to getting back into the classroom."

"I believe it." He held out the plastic box he'd brought from the raptor. "A first-aid kit. Just in case."

"Thanks," Laura took the box, then remembered that she had no place to store it. She tossed it on the bed, then pressed her fingers to her temples. “This is a nightmare. How the hell am I supposed to live here?”

Bill's eyes swept the interior of the tent again. “Maybe it's time to check out the market, see what they have in the way of furniture.”

“I suppose so.”

“I would join you, but...” he trailed off, gesturing in the general direction of the door.

A surprising heaviness settled in Laura's chest. “Of course. You have to get back, I understand.” She managed a smile. “Thank you for your help.”

She knew Bill had to go back to _Galactica_ , of course, but the realization that she would no longer have his company was a sharp one. They'd grown closer during the weeks since the election, since he sat down with her and laid out the truths she didn't want to accept. From that point, without the filter of their positions distorting her judgment, she could admit that he was practically the only friend she had. Everyone else still saw her as the president, or as a desperate, failed leader, not as a person.

Now she wouldn't be able to see Bill for weeks or months at a time. It would be a tough adjustment. They had been meeting almost every evening, and more than a few afternoons, for meals and an occasional glass of ambrosia, discussing Colonial literature, or rumors about New Caprica, or anything else of little to no consequence. There were no expectations or schemes between them; there was only the time they enjoyed spending together.

Laura felt slow and clichéd. She hadn't known how much she enjoyed that time until it was too late. She was an idiot for spending the last few of those evenings complaining, on and on, about New Caprica. Worst of all, she felt stranded, cut off, adrift.

“Not a problem.” Bill's response brought her back to the situation at hand. “I didn't want you to end up on one of those delayed shuttles and risk getting in trouble with Baltar.”

She laughed softly. “Yeah." 

“You'll let me know if you need anything, right?”

Laura nodded. She probably wouldn't, of course. He had bigger things to worry about; his ship, his people, the security of what remained of the Fleet. He didn't need her calling up with requests for creature comforts.

“I should probably go, before it gets dark--”

When he stepped toward the door, she reacted without thinking. Closing the distance between them, she rested her hands on his shoulders and drew her lips against his. Once, twice, light and slow, almost daring him to respond. Which he did, after taking a moment to catch up, bringing his hands up to frame her face. Time slowed, or maybe it disappeared, as they stood inside her pitiful home.

What had started as her knee-jerk reaction turned into an enjoyable distraction. They settled on a slow, luxurious rhythm, deliberate enough to flood her senses with his heartbeat against her chest, the slide of his thumb along her throat, the patter of intensifying rain on canvas, the drag of her fingers against the worn twill of his uniform, the drip-drip of water on her head...

Laura pulled back, casting an annoyed glance upward. She took a step back, out of the line of fire, and held her palm out under the leak to gauge its severity. Within a few seconds, the drops turned into a thin, yet steady, stream, filling her palm with water. “Great.”

Bill, who had been watching her with furrowed brows, started laughing once he figured out why she had pulled away from him. Laura sighed and wiped her hand on her pants. She almost wanted to glare him down, but the absurdity of the situation won out in the end. She rubbed at her eyes with her dry hand and mumbled. “That doesn't bode well for this place.”

She dropped her hand when he cleared his throat. He was still smiling. “I really gotta go now.” He nodded toward the leak. “I'll bring another patch next time.”

 _Next time._ That made the situation bearable, gave her something to look forward to.

Bill reached over and squeezed her shoulder lightly. “Good luck.”

He stepped out into the rain before she could even say, “Thanks.”


End file.
